Category Archives: Purpose 3

A Deep Breaking of Purpose 3: Stewarding His Rule and Reflecting His Character

3 Purposes, Biblical Insight, Purpose 3

God originally designed us with the three purposes in mind, the third purpose being:

To steward his rule and reign in creation by reflecting His glory and character to creation.

God placed our great-great-great parents in the Garden of Eden to have dominion over the creation.

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”  (Genesis 1:26-28)

Humanity was called to steward God’s rule on behalf of God to the Creation. God shared this privilege with mankind. We were to have have dominion over creation as His caretakers, not to dominate it. And we were not to confuse our role with God’s role. We are the stewards, God is the owner. We are the managers, God is the Creator, for that is God’s position alone.

And how were we to steward his rule and reign? By providing creation a glimpse of God. We were created in His image so that we might reflect His glory and character to all of the Garden–His goodness, kindness, and mercy. We possessed that ability as we lived in His presence (purpose #1) and in authentic relational community (purposer #2). So as the moon reflects the sun, we were to reflect the care and supervision of God to the creation.

    Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness . . . 
    So God created man in his own image,
        in the image of God he created him;
        male and female he created them.  (Genesis 1:26, 27 ESV)

We were to be stewards of the King and His Kingdom, to ‘image’ God to the creation. And it was good…

But Then the Fall Happened

After the Fall, humanity ceases to steward God’s Kingdom and instead we begin to attempt to build our own kingdoms. We ceased to graciously have dominion over creation and instead tried to dominate it for our own benefit. We tried to play the role of God. This is clearly seen in the Tower of Babel account (Genesis 11:1-9 mouseover verse), where man decided they would be ‘just like God.’ Of course this leads to disaster, and we, when we choose to live apart from Christ, continue to take the same tact and yield the same results on a global scale–wars, terror, genocide, abortion, etc.–and on an individual level–dominating others for the almighty dollar, sexual gain, or position. We build our own castles and bastions of power. Our ability to accurately reflect God’s glory and character to creation was distorted like a tarnished fun-house mirror.

The Fall also affected creation as it attempts to dominate us. Instead of willfully yielding as in the Garden, the post-Fall creation requires man to toil to receive its fruits. To Adam, God says:

Cursed is the ground because of you;
        in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life;
    thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you;
        and you shall eat the plants of the field.
    By the sweat of your face
        you shall eat bread, (Genesis 3:17-19 ESV)

And so Our Enemy used fallen creation to rail against humanity with disease, distortion, defects and yes, even  brains that are biologically susceptible to addiction, habitual sin, and hurting others. This biological crash-and-burn does not render us free of culpability, but it can compound our willful capitulation towards sin. As Christians, we don’t have to totally discount the addiction-as-disease model but we cannot completely concede our wrong behavior to it either.

So, here ends Act 1 of the Three Purposes. Humanity is left beaten and broken, exiled from Eden and aliens to the ability to fulfill God’s intended purposes. BUT GOD is infinitely good and had foreseen the Fall, and He had a rescue plan in place for us before He ever began creation. All was not lost, and all is not lost for you or me no matter how far we have drifted from God or sunken into the mire of our sin. There is Good News coming….stay tuned.

 

 

 

A Deep Breaking of Purpose 1: Broken Fellowship

3 Purposes, Biblical Insight, Purpose 1, Purpose 2, Purpose 3, , , ,

In the Fall seen in Genesis 3, there was a deep breaking. When Adam and Eve disobeyed God, they passed on an ugly gift to each of us–a sin nature. For a long time, I viewed sin as something that made God angry–a wrong thought, attitude or behavior. I also clearly understood I had a sin nature as it raised up its head so often in my life. But there was a deeper breaking than this. What I have to consider fully is the degree that sin had broken or distorted God’s three purposes if we are going see victory and freedom.

P1: To fellowship with God in the nearness of His presence.

After Adam and Eve sinned, God appeared in the garden for another walk in the cool of the evening as He had time and time before. However, this time Adam and Eve, in shame, had hidden themselves realizing that they were naked. God asked them  the question that we, too, must answer, “Where are you?” An Adam did what we all tend to do. He pitched the blame like a hot potato elsewhere (Genesis 3:12 mouseover verse). And in doing so

The Fall continues to affect us in the same way. I, like others, tend to hide in shame in when I sin. I tend to make excuses and pitch blame. These actions only serve to make me less aware that fellowship with God that is available to me through Christ. At these times, I find myself being more of a deist, thinking that God is out there watching, rather than a theist, knowing that He is intervening and available. I tend to try to take control of things–attempting to covering myself like Adam in order to please God. I do what I heard a member of my recovery group recently say. I attempt to have a good day and then ask, “God, what do you think of me today?” as  if I were participating in some kind of giant make-it-up-to-you-God exercise. This is of course, ultimately ridiculous and futile.

God’s availability to me and my awareness of the nearness of His presence is only because of Christ and what He has accomplished that I cannot. He has restored the potential of Eden to me and to you as we live in union with Him. More to come on that hope in future posts. For now you and I must continue to dissect what is broken in us if we are able to have victory over our sin, our habits, our hurts, and our addictions.

God’s Original Purpose for Us, Made Simple

3 Purposes, Biblical Insight, Purpose 1, Purpose 2, Purpose 3

God has a purpose for creating us. In the garden of Eden, He tells us that purpose through a narrative of humanity in a perfected state, unstained by sin. This is what our full humanity is to look like. These purposes are what God is moving us towards, even as sin and addiction fights against it. This is what we are battling for  in the beautiful fight.  Many times, we approach Genesis 1-3 as a modern Christians wearing our apologetic sunglasses. Our main purposes seems to be using the text for wrestling with those who are of a naturalistic evolutionary bent. This is a huge mistake, for this is not the prime reason Genesis 1-3 made it into our Bibles. YES, God is Creator of all things. That fact is vital.  (And whether you believe it occurred in six literal days or leave open the potential it happening over billion of years does not matter to me. In fact, for the point I am making here, your view of whether there was one literal Adam and Eve or the first couple were a metaphorical type of humanity doesn’t  matter, though I fall into the first camp.

 God established three purposes for us that are clearly seen in the story of Adam and Eve in Eden.

P1. To fellowship with God as we realize the nearness of His presence.

Genesis 3:8 And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day

P2. To live in authentic community (relationships), and to multiply that community by including others.

Genesis 2:18 Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.”

Genesis 1:28 …And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth…

P3. To rule and reign on His behalf, by bearing and reflecting His image (character).

Genesis 1:26-28

    Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”
    So God created man in his own image,
        in the image of God he created him;
        male and female he created them.
    And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

Throughout The Wretched Saint blog, I will reflect on the 3 purposes and what it means for recovery and the beautiful fight. You can follow this series by clicking on the category drop down category menu at the right. As I reflect on my own brutal yet beautiful fight to be who God desires me to be, I am realizing my processing of what sin–both Adam’s and my own–has done to distort these three purposes AND what God has done, is doing, and will do to restore me to His original perfected purposes is crucial to victory and freedom.